Gaming Guru

Odds at Pick 'Em Poker, Ball Control in Roulette

A shuffle through the Gaming mailbag, with questions on Pick 'Em poker and
roulette:

Q. What are the odds of getting a full house and also four of a kind in Pick
'Em Poker? I play mostly at the Soaring Eagle casino in Mt. Pleasant, Mich.,
and Pick 'Em Poker is their only full pay machine.

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I played 16,016 hands of Pick 'Em Poker using the Bob Dancer Presents
WinPoker software.
Here are my results keeping track of four of a kinds, which I feel is the
main hand you would need to get in order to have a winning session.
According to your Video Poker Answer Book, the odds on getting a royal flush
are extremely high. I presume the odds on a straight flush must be pretty
high also. (Maybe you could give me those odds also.)

I used the correct strategy on every hand because I used the "warn" signal
if I was making a mistake. I played max coins. I received seven four of a
kinds in the first 5,530 hands, which I think must be above average because
I didn't get my eighth four of a kind until the 16,016th hand, which means
it took 10,486 hands to get the last one. I would have been 1,625 coins
ahead after my seventh four of a kind but 1,170 coins down after my eighth.

Bill, via e-mail

A. Let's start with a little explanation of Pick 'Em, which is not as common
on casino floors as are five-card draw poker games. In Pick 'Em, the player
sees four cards on the initial deal. On two, there is no decision - they
remain part of the player's final five-card hand. The others are the top
cards in two three-card stacks. The player chooses one stack to round out
the hand.

There is no draw once you have your five cards. Since you're really only
eliminating one possible card from a 52-card deck, odds are much closer to
those on five-card stud poker than on five-card draw. Royal flushes occur an
average of once per 315,818 hands, instead of the once per 40,000 or so on
five-card draw games.

Straight flushes come up an average of once per 38,451 hands in Pick 'Em,
making them nearly as rare as royals in draw poker.

As for four-of-a-kind hands, Bill is correct - hitting seven within 5,530
hands is far above normal frequency. On the average, Pick 'Em players hit
four of a kind once per 2,361 hands. In Bill's 5,530 hands, normal
expectation would be for two to three sets of quads.

Frequency of other winning hands in Pick 'Em comes to once per 424 hands for
full houses; once per 314 hands for flushes; once per 197 for straights;
once per 33 for three of a kind; once per 16 for two pair, and once per 4.4
for a pair of 9s or better.
Overall, Pick 'Em players win about 33 percent of all hands, compared with
about 40 percent in most five-card draw games.

However, payoffs on winning hands are higher in Pick 'Em than in other
games. Given a five-coin wager, full-pay Pick 'Em pays 6,000 coins for a
royal, 1,199 for a straight flush, 600 for four of a kind, 90 for a full
house, 75 for a flush, 55 for a straight, 25 for three of a kind, 15 for two
pair and 10 for a pair of 9s or better. The expected return in the long run
with expert play is 99.95 percent.

Q. I have a running argument with my sister-in-law. She is a big fan of the
game of roulette and insists that the dealer has the ability to control the
ball's final destination.

I, on the other hand, insist that there are far too many variables to
substantiate her argument. She'll tell me that a dealer will tell her that
he/she is "aiming" for a certain number and my sister-in-law will bet
accordingly. I say that this is no different than a dealer at the Caribbean
Stud or Let it Ride tables prompting the player to make the extra $1 bet for
the extra payoff for a larger hand. We know that this extra $1 bet is a
sucker bet, yet I have never seen anyone pass on this bet, myself included.

Finally, I know that if any casino sensed any kind of impropriety on the
part of any of its dealers that the dealer would be pulled faster than you
can blink.

I may have been a bit long-winded, but I ask that you settle this argument.
Can a dealer at the roulette table impart any influence upon the ball's
final destination?

F.G., via e-mail

A. You've about covered it. With the wheel spinning one way, the ball going
in the opposite direction, bouncing on the surface and from fret to fret
separating the numbers, there are far too many physical variables for a
dealer to control where the ball will land.

Dealers not only can't control where the ball is going, their employers
don't want them to. As long as the results are random, the casino makes its
money. With a random wheel, the house has a 5.26 percent house edge on a
double-zero game that is unchanging.

However, if a dealer could control what numbers were coming up, there's a
chance someone would be in on the secret and take a lot of money from the
casino. That's the last thing the owners want. Random games mean big profits
for the operators. Taking the randomness out increases operator risk.

This article is provided by the Frank Scoblete Network. Melissa A. Kaplan is the network's managing editor. If you would like to use this article on your website, please contact Casino City Press, the exclusive web syndication outlet for the Frank Scoblete Network. To contact Frank, please e-mail him at fscobe@optonline.net.

John Grochowski is the best-selling author of The Craps Answer Book, The Slot Machine Answer Book and The Video Poker Answer Book. His weekly column is syndicated to newspapers and Web sites, and he contributes to many of the major magazines and newspapers in the gaming field, including Midwest Gaming and Travel, Slot Manager, Casino Journal, Strictly Slots and Casino Player.

Listen to John Grochowski's "Casino Answer Man" tips Tuesday through Friday at 5:18 p.m. on WLS-AM (890) in Chicago. Look for John Grochowski on Facebook and Twitter @GrochowskiJ.

John Grochowski Websites:

Books by John Grochowski:

John Grochowski is the best-selling author of The Craps Answer Book, The Slot Machine Answer Book and The Video Poker Answer Book. His weekly column is syndicated to newspapers and Web sites, and he contributes to many of the major magazines and newspapers in the gaming field, including Midwest Gaming and Travel, Slot Manager, Casino Journal, Strictly Slots and Casino Player.

Listen to John Grochowski's "Casino Answer Man" tips Tuesday through Friday at 5:18 p.m. on WLS-AM (890) in Chicago. Look for John Grochowski on Facebook and Twitter @GrochowskiJ.

Books by John Grochowski:

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